Today is Betsie's second birthday!  Or the joke in our house...at least we think it is.  Since Betsie was found as an abandoned baby, the doctor had to estimate her birthday.  But at that age, it has to be pretty close.  She was found August 9th and estimated to be 2 days old...so we're going with it!  Last night we had a pitiful looking homemade birthday cake and sang to her.  I wish we had videotaped her dancing and laughing while we sang Happy Birthday.  My still pictures didn't capture how cool she thought it was.  It took her forever to blow out her big #2 candle because we have convinced her that fire is something to stay away from.  Try blowing out a candle from three feet back sometime!  Really, the cake and gifts have all been done, so today will be a rather normal day.  (You can do that when they're two!)  But I will be thinking all day how blessed we are to be Betsie's parents.

Happy birthday Little One!

Come on, Betsie.  You can do it! 

This week in May is a busy and exciting one each year.  Yesterday Jason and I celebrated our 14th anniversary.  We can't believe how God has blessed us in 14 years.  We think we have learned a lot, but it's clear to us that we have so much more to learn.  I look back at that 20 year old girl that got married and think that the people who said we were too young may have been right!  On the other hand, being so young helped me to overlook a lot of things that would be hard now (like how broke we were then!).  Jason has been a better husband to me than anyone else ever could.  When I struggle with fear, he reads the Bible outloud to me.  He has learned that he can't reason with me or talk me into a peaceful heart, but that God can.  And then there are the children God has given us, one of them 7 years ago today!

Today, Mary Evelyn is a seven year old.  I can't believe it!  Yep, our 7th anniversary was a doozy.  I was what they call about to pop!    Mary Evelyn is such a funny little girl and she has a big big heart.  True, she has earned a reputation for being a tad, um, sensitive at times.  Still, she cares a lot about people who have less than her.  There is a homeless man by the name of Earl that sits outside at the Chick-Fil-A near us in the mornings.  If she ever sees him, we have to stop and buy him breakfast.  She wants to give him clothes and all kinds of things all the time.  I do love that about her.  And her prayers!  She melts my heart to hear her pray.  I am so thankful for this little one and all that I have learned by being her mother.

To celebrate her birthday, we went to the Georgia Aquarium yesterday.  (yep, on our anniversary)  It was a surprise and she was SO excited to find out where we were going!  It was hard to get good pictures because of the lighting and the glass, the crowds, and because my kids would rather look at the fish than the camera.  But here are a few anyway.  Enjoy!

We got some new sand this weekend.  Mary Evelyn chose blue, which is of course lots more fun than plain sand!  Betsie doesn't sit still for long, but she sat in the same spot for over an HOUR filling a bucket with her little shovel.  Here's a few pictures. 

Just before church this morning...and no time to get all three smiling at once! 

The Blessing Jar   You all probably know by now that I get all my ideas from books or other blogs or the Five in a Row boards.  This is one of those ideas.  The blessing jar is the place where we put little pieces of paper to be read on New Year's Eve or New Year's Day next year.  On those pieces of paper are descriptions of ways God has blessed us throughout the year...big and small.  So far this year that's everything from a free dryer given to us the day after ours broke by a lady in our homeschool group to Jason taking the girls skating to the dog not killing the hermit crab when she decided to take her to her crate.    It's only the end of January and that jar is filling up fast.  I can't wait to read all those blessings together as a family at the end of the year. 

Pigtails!!!    Woohoo!!  Betsie has finally gotten just enough hair to barely get the tiniest little twig of a pigtail on each side.  And she lets me do it and leaves them alone (most of the time anyway).  Since a picture is worth 1000 words, I'll just show the the picture and be quiet. 

When she has little pigtails I call her Ting-Ting.  A family from our agency named their baby Ava Ting-Ting and I guess I just like to say it. 

Day 94:  Today was the 94th day of school in our house.  (My state requires 180 days and that we keep attendance.)  I usually start in July and try to have 100 days completed by Christmas, but sickness and the addition of little Ting-Ting up there has slowed us down a bit.  But we are plugging right along and the girls ARE learning, so that's good news.

Tax Season:   It's here!  And that means Jason is not.  He's at work right now finishing up some things for a deadline tomorrow.  Unless you live with a CPA who works in a CPA firm, you might not realize that April 15th isn't the only deadline for tax season.  There is a deadline for the end of January.  You know all that stuff you need to file your return?  Somebody has to prepare and get it to you by the end of January.  And there is a big March 15th deadline too.  Corporate taxes.  And several others throughout the year.  But April 15th is still the biggie.  I wonder how many school days we can do by April 15th? 

Jason's parents both celebrate birthdays this month.  Friday we honored them at a small surprise cake and ice cream party.  Nothing elaborate, just a time for Jason and his brother to publicly thank them for SO MUCH and to present them with an ALASKAN CRUISE!  (They were shocked.)  Also, Jason wrote a poem as a tribute to them.  He had it framed along with pictures of our families and the logos of the businesses Jason's parents helped to start for their sons. 

Here's a few pictures from the party

The whole family

Jason reading the poem (below) he wrote for his mom and dad

TRIBUTE

how great the sun to light each day

to illumine our weary ways

and, too, the moon, its small companion,

a gift in evening rays,

and note the might in nature seen

the tall and aged tree

to span it’s stoutly branches heav’nward

to reach and brush the breeze

though great these gifts from nature seen

gifts from God on high,

a mother and a father

are by far the better prize

for theirs the soul they give each child

to prosper and to give

they lay a lasting legacy

for the child to see and live

worn and weary are their hands

cheeks stained from many tears

with faiths now strong, abiding still

prayers to God span years

a tribute to our father, our mother

paternal strength that guides

a tribute to your legacy

now in our lives abides

Girls from the Hunan Province of China are called Spicy Girls.  They are supposed to have spicy personalities and the food in Hunan is H~O~T!!  Well, the food part is true, and now I believe the spicy personality part is probably true as well.  Betsie has really fired things up around here!  We love our little Hunan princess, but she is a handful!  In the last week or two, she has learned how to climb out of her crib and has pulled a hot lamp onto her hand, causing quite a burn.  We took care of the crib diving by immediately getting a tent that fits over the crib.  Ahhh, peace of mind.  And the burn on her hand is healing well so far.  Here's a few pictures of our spicy girl. 

Mommy, it wasn't ME who colored on the walls...see, I only color on paper!

Mary Evelyn and Betsie sliding together.  Betsie LOVES her sisters.

She can still run around like a wild child even in the tent.  See that scroll to the right with Chinese characters?  That's her Chinese name, Xiao Ying Hong. 

Proof that we need the tent.  See that foot up on the edge of the crib?  She's one determined little girl. 

We had such a fun time tonight.  We went to Hollywild.  It's a local place with lots and lots of animals.  They have a huge lights display at Christmas time.  Besides all the great lights, you get to ride through their Enchanted Deer Forest.  There must have been a few hundred deer in this field.  You drive through (with the food you of course purchase on the way in!) with windows down.  The deer (and even a couple of zebras!) come right to your car and let you hand feed them!  Mary Evelyn actually said, "This is a dream come true!"  (She cracks us up.)  We had two zebras eating out of our hands at one point as well.  Betsie was taking it all in, but she was not about to get close.  We kept wondering if she was thinking, "Where did all these huge doggies come from?" 

After you ride through the lights and deer forest, you can go to the petting zoo, also totally decorated with tons of lights.  Rachel and Mary Evelyn got to feed the baby goats a bottle of milk.  Loved that.  As we were leaving we got some hot chocolate.    It was really fun and we definitely hope to do it again next year. 

This llama was actually picky and wouldn't eat the food after he sniffed it! 

Rachel bottle feeding a goat.

Betsie was very not too sure about the animals...curious, but very cautious.

Mary Evelyn feeding a goat.

Do you see how close this zebra is to us?  He put his head in our car! 

More pictures 

When we had pictures made last week, the photographers took over 100 pictures and we have a CD with ALL of them!  Rather than give everyone in the family 100 pictures each, I'll try to share a few here. 

Here are individual shots of each of my girls. 

Rachel:  (Mom, this is the one that I think looks like that baby picture in your kitchen.)

Mary Evelyn: 

Betsie:

So thankful for my family, which by God's grace is just a little bit bigger this year!

Yes, Betsie made it a little difficult to get good pictures, but you can definitely see her personality in these shots! 

At our house today:

Rachel felt terrible.  This little girl hardly needs more sleep than I do, but she was tired all day.  Her throat still hurts and she still had a fever.  When I went to see what she was doing today, here is how I found her...fast asleep.  Praying my big girl is feeling better tomorrow.  She has already gone to bed.

Mary Evelyn was feeling SO much better.  She has had her antibiotic for a whole day longer than her sister.  She helped me make haystacks for our dessert to go with Sunday lunch (which happened to be take out from a Greek Restaurant.)  She is looking at a gardening/landscaping book with Jason right now.  You never know with Mary Evelyn what kind of bedtime story you'll be reading if she gets to choose! 

Betsie was her normal cute self.  She walked around trying to find things to get into, laughed, ate, slept, watched a Baby Einstein DVD, and tried to wake Rachel up from her nap. 

This picture is not actually from the vacation.  It's at a local park in our city.  We took Flat Stanley with us.  He's from a homeschool family in New York. 

We just returned from a short trip today.  We were staying with my parents at the beach.  It was just a short getaway.  Rachel and Mary Evelyn had not been anywhere at all for a year, though they have had many local adventures.    We were on a little island off the coast and it is so pretty there.  The weather was perfect. 

We weren't sure how Betsie would do on the car ride.  It seems silly that it would even be a concern after flying home from CHINA with her, but she has changed SO much!  And now that she can walk, a carseat is the last place she wants to be.  However, she did great, sleeping quite a bit in the car and all night each night we were there. 

We saw lots of animals that we didn't expect to see on a beach trip including an egret, an alligator, 3 deer, a racoon, and some HUGE spiders (which were blessedly in webs outside nowhere near our condo).  The girls enjoyed swimming in the ocean and Rachel got to go on the boat with her grandparents.  They saw dolphins! 

What kind of bird is this that we saw in the marshes?  Jason says an egret, but I haven't looked it up yet.

Unfortunately though, the girls were just not themselves so we kept them in all day yesterday and by last night, Mary Evelyn was just plain miserable.  We ended up leaving the restaurant and going to an urgent care place, where she was diagnosed with strep.  And Rachel got the same diagnosis today upon returning home.  Poor babies. 

I still think it was a nice trip, and I am thankful to know that my girls are on their way to feeling better now.  We will miss another Sunday at church...seems someone is always home sick.  I am still going to try and have a nice Sunday lunch (see previous post), even if it is take out on nice dishes.   

Rachel pushing Betsie in the stroller.  We took a nice long walk that morning. 

Rachel trying to read the funnies, and Betsie there "helping" her.  I just thought it was a cute picture. 

My baby girl is ONE!  We met her 6 weeks ago in Changsha, Hunan.  She was a scared little thing, weighing something like 13 pounds.  Now she is a whopping 15.5 pounds and is Miss Personality!  We are enjoying her so much.  Even when she needs to be loved and held in the middle of the night, I am cherishing every minute of it.  We are so grateful to have her home for her birthday.  Here are a few pictures of our sweet little Betsie. 

Playing with Rachel at her new Leapfrog play table.

Playing with Rose.  (who is wanting that plush penguin for a serious game of fetch)

Busted!  Actually, she stays out of the dogfood most of the time.  Notice how wet the legs of the sleeper are.  She had fun splashing in the water too.

She looks like she's crying, but she's actually laughing and dancing.  This would have been a good time for the video camera.

Is it already late July?  Normally we would have started our school year by now.  This year has been different though.  We added Betsie to our family!  Betsie is a sweet little baby from China.  She is almost a year old and very active!  We traveled from June 23rd to July 7th to go and get her, so it has been a crazy summer.  We are so glad to have her home and no longer be "in the adoption process."  So now we are getting adjusted to being a family of five. 

I glanced over the blog and saw that I need to update several things.  I did update the book we are reading together, but I have to work on the curriculum and a few other things.  I'm still working on plans for the new school year, which I hope to begin around mid-August.  We'll have lots of changes this year with a baby (who will quickly become a walking toddler).  I know I have to guard against unreasonable expectations which lead to frustration over things not going like I hope.  I'll be trying to lead my older girls into more independence with their work this year, especially Rachel. 

We are still committed to homeschooling, even in these crazy years where life just happens.  I know Rachel and Mary Evelyn will be learning a lot of valuable lessons by having Betsie in our family.  Somehow all the academic work will get done too. 

I'll have to ease back into blogging here just like I have to ease back into all our other routines.  (I do have another blog going about the adoption.  See the post below this one for the address.)

More later!!!

      Mary Evelyn, Betsie, and Rachel...all together on one continent at last!

I just typed a long post and lost it.  So let me just say Happy 6th Birthday Mary Evelyn (a day late!).    She had a great time last night at Fuddrucker's with all her grandparents and Uncle Jim, Aunt Laura, and baby cousin Lydia.  And she is having a blast this morning playing with all her loot.  She is running around the house in a Tinkerbell costume playing with plastic snakes.  That's my girl! 

Here are a few photos...

It was a tad bright on this side of the table!  Jason and Jim look like they ar having such a good time!

Happy little Lydia

Opening gifts...this one happened to be a Barbie car.  I wonder who will ride in it more, Barbies or toy animals?

Staged picture of blowing out candles (the real picture was all pole!).  Mary Evelyn had a giant cookie instead of a cake, and she wanted a pig on it.  Oink oink.

Rachel's green teeth from the toy vending machine...lovely.

This morning in the Tinkerbell costume

I am loving these nice spring days.  The girls have been getting out so much more lately.  Today after church we went to my brother-in-law's house (us and about 30 other people) to eat and play!  Mary Evelyn talked her Nana into getting her a HUGE plastic container off the refrigerator to use for a bug jar.  It wasn't long before she and her little buddy had a butterfly and who knows what else.  The bigger kids - plus a few grown ups - played whiffle ball in the back yard.  It was so nice.  The fellowship was nice too.  Most people there were from our church and it was a blessing to hear people just chatting about what God has done for them recently and over a period of many years.

These pictures aren't from our lunch today...just some recent springtime pictures I wanted to share.  Enjoy!

Here's Rachel appreciating the swing after ignoring it most of the winter!

Sweet Mary Evelyn.  I was SO glad she agreed to give me a smile for this picture! 

Me and my girls.  (Rachel had to find a way to make sure her Mermaid-topia got in the picture.  She is so proud because she bought it herself...and on sale too!)

Here she is sporting the dress we got from our agency yesterday.  It's pretty short and I'm not sure how "lady like" she can be in it!  She wants to wear it to co-op today, but it's too cold.  Maybe I can let her wear if after the referral comes. 

Yesterday was my dear Rachel's 8th birthday.  She is taking after me in that she loves her birthday!  (I can't imagine getting too old to not like my birthday!   )  She wanted to go out to eat somewhere that would bring her a dessert and sing to her!  We went out with Jason's parents and brother and all sang to her over a round of strawberry shortcake. 

There are so many reasons to love Rachel.  I am so glad God let me be her mother.  I delight in watching her grow into a "big girl" from a little one in what seems like a few days!  But she still has that childhood innocence that I hope will be there for a long time.  She still loves dolls and crafts and swinging in the backyard.  She likes princesses and fancy dresses and tea parties.  Boys are just other people you can be friends with.  She is a messy little packrat, but it's kind of funny when I step back from drill-sarge-mom-mode and look at what she finds worthy of keeping around. 

Rachel's birthday party was Saturday.  She told me afterward that it was even better than she thought it would be.    The children each got to tie-dye a pillowcase.  Of course there was the usual cake, ice cream, and gifts.  Other than that, they just played in the back yard.  Nothing too fancy, but in her mind, it just doesn't get any better than that! 

So belated Happy Birthday Rachel!  I love you!

Have a tea party of course!

Last week we were all sick.  That Thursday (2/23/06) the girls and I were supposed to have a tea party and start our unit study on purity, using The Princess and the Kiss as our basis.  But that day I was miserable and could NOT do it.  By Sunday, I was a bit better, but even though both girls had fevers, they were still asking to please do the tea party!  So...we did!

Rachel was in pajamas, but Mary Evelyn decided her disco diva dress up clothes were more fitting for the occasion.  (It was just the first lesson, okay!)  We draped a sheet on the little table for a table cloth and got out the fancy china.  I read the book with my scratchy voice and we talked a lot about God's love for us and how he treasures us.  Then we made treasure boxes!  Each girl had craft jewels and glued them all over little boxes I got at Wal-Mart.  The idea is to put something tangible in each week to represent that week's lesson.  I haven't looked far enough ahead to see what will go in next week yet. 

Here is a picture of my princesses from the first Princess tea party.  Oh, and Jason had to go to our bedroom because of course there are NO BOYS ALLOWED at princess tea parties!